It dabbles a little with the cult and the occult but somehow fails to reach a proper conclusion, at least in my head. She is mysterious, yet bold, extremely clear about her aims. The heroine in the story has all the hallmarks of a du Maurier heroine and which is why the reader is instantly attracted to her. Monte Veritá ( translates to Hill of Truth ) has a premise that had immense potential, drawing from the plethora of tales, fables and myths that surround the mountain with the same name in Switzerland. The only thing you don’t know is what catastrophe it is actually going to be. You know it is happening soon and it is inevitable. The kind of eery that does not need any harbingers or subtle hints to tell you something is going to go horribly wrong. The story has a distinctly eery feeling all over it, from the start to the finish. And well it does and gets only worse as the story progresses. But he cannot outrightly shrug the feeling that something more nefarious is about to happen. The narrator, who works on a farm, initially attributes it to the arrival winter and changing weather patterns, probably causing the birds to get confused. Believed to be a metaphorical reference to the air strikes of WWII, particularly the Blitz, it is thrilling and sinister, not in the “All will be well in the end way.” It starts with the birds in a Cornish seaside town starting to being in an inexplicably strange way, turning distinctly malevolent and aggressive. The Birds is definitely my favourite story.
The collection comprises of following six short stories, each of which is a little dark but also has a certain clandestine charm to it, the feeling of not becoming fond of it outrightly but getting hooked to it in a gradual manner. As bizarre as it might sound, The Birds was indeed an extremely “visual” experience for me. In any case, as one read The Birds, one realises how vivid are the images that form in your mind even as you are reading it. While my opinion of the movie The Birds is not as amazing as its story, I still am a huge fan of the book.
It was only later that I learnt that several of her works have been adapted to the silver screen by Hitchcock. Even as I was reading the first story of this anthologies, I found myself thinking about how amazing the story would be when turned into a movie. Because it is simply amazing! Also, her writing lends itself to cinematic experience so naturally. But, still, every du Maurier story gives me high, honestly! Yes yes, you can roll your eyes and say that I have caught the revival bug, but I am just glad that I found her work even if I found it this late in my life. I don’t need that reassurance though, I have already jumped over the boundaries of blind faith in her writing by this point. If you need any proof of how amazing Daphne du Maurier’s writing is, do give The Birds and Other Stories a go. The Birds and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier
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